Over the past few years, the Portuguese wine industry has labored mightily to change the common equation Portugal = Port. ViniPortugal, the industry’s trade arm, has blitzed the United States with tastings and seminars for the trade and the wine-loving public; swank events to introduce non-Port wines from the many Portuguese growing regions. Last year, we attended a sumptuous wine dinner at L’Espalier (http://tinyurl.com/yjhc4dm), which paired a dozen Portuguese wines with adventu... Read Full Story
The sun shone, the sky was a radiant blue, the tents billowed in a late summer breeze. In short, Mother Nature—or maybe it was Mrs. Vanderbilt—cooperated this year with the Newport Mansions Wine & Food Festival (at least on Saturday.) Last year’s event was marred by monsoon-like rain, which sent rivulets of mud through those same beautiful tents. This year not even the recession could tarnish this fantastic seaside festival. Yes, the Friday night gala at The Breakers ser... Read Full Story
Our last blog post extolled the virtues of newly discovered (by us) Malbec wines from the Cahors region of Southwest France. We thought it might be fun to stage a shoot-out between a stately old world Malbec and a sassy competitor from the new world of Argentina. The venue was our kitchen with cheeseburgers at 30 paces….2005 Chateau De Cenac Eulalie vs. 2005 Kaiken Malbec UltraWe got lucky at the Cahors Malbec show and snagged a couple of bottles from our favorite winery Chateau De Cena... Read Full Story
It’s unusual to start one of our posts with a quiz, but we couldn’t resist….
What two countries are celebrated for producing the world’s best Malbec?
Here’s a hint… they are on different continents… Tick, Tick, Tick, Tick.
OK, You obviously got Argentina right. But if you also said the United States, you’re wrong.
It’s France! The Cahors region, to be precise. This small area slightly east of Bordeaux and North of Toulouse produces glorious Mal... Read Full Story
We met with Doug Miles, Miles Wine Cellars’ co-founder, owner, and winemaker, at his storied lakefront Greek revival mansion in Himrod, NY. Doug and his dad spent nearly two decades renovating the 1802 estate, with Doug personally crafting or restoring the intricate woodwork, stairways, and moldings. His caring, diligent workmanship is also visible across the 60 acres of vineyards his family has been tending since the late 1970’s. Among the grapes are Cabernet Franc, Chardonnay, Rieslin... Read Full Story
Gary Barletta of Long Point Winery has eight acres of vines in Aurora NY but sources most of his grapes from California (Mendocino and Lodi). That’s raised a few hackles in the Finger Lakes’ wine community. Isn’t that sacrilegious? Isn’t that cheating? You can almost hear them huffing, “Sure, we could make phenomenal Zinfandel too if we imported our grapes.”Well, if you’re a purist, you can log off now. But for those of you looking for special wines at a value price and don’t care where the d... Read Full Story
We spent our last day visiting three wineries on Keuka Lake—one unknown, one celebrated, and one disappointment. Keuka boasts the smallest wine trail, with just eight wineries spread across a very narrow, but pristine, lake. Since we wanted to get home by bedtime, we limited our visit to Ravines Wine Cellars, McGregor Vineyard and Winery, and Dr. Konstantin Frank Wines. We’ll dispense with our first stop right away. McGregor was the disappointment. People rave about the Black Russian Re... Read Full Story
According to Lisa’s
meticulously (some might say annoyingly) planned itinerary, Finger Lakes Day
Four was reserved for the east side of Seneca Lake. But since we changed our housing from Geneva to Penn Yan, the
path to the east side was best reached by traversing the West side again. That
gave us an opportunity to visit wineries we had missed the previous day. And
since “flexibility” was now our middle name, we just went with the flow. First stop was Rock Stream Vineyards & Dis... Read Full Story
Before moving any further with our wine diary, attention must be paid to the amazing Bed & Breakfast we stumbled onto in Penn Yan, Los Gatos. When our Geneva B&B didn't work out we scrambled to find another centrally located place to stay. Thumbing through tourist brochures and crazily navigating Trip Advisor and Hotels.com we found Los Gatos, called for a reservation, and breathed a sigh of relief when a friendly woman on the other line said she had a vacancy. We quickly checked out ... Read Full Story
On Tuesday our wine touring kicked into high gear. After dropping our bags in Penn Yann at Los Gatos B&B (more on this lucky find in tomorrow's post) we set our course for a whirlwind tour of the west side of Seneca Lake. Our first stop was Fox Run Vineyards & Cafe, one of the best known wineries in the area, yet one of the least interesting. It seemed like all the wines had too much slate, shale, and acid mixed in with the fruit. We quickly departed and moved on to ... Read Full Story
